Hi, This is my first post in the forum.For a summer project I want to repaint my black Concord 1 white but have no experience repainting guitars and was wondering the correct procedure. It's quite old and has been used a lot, with a lot of chips in the body. Should i start by covering up all the holes from the electronics and hardware with masking tape and blue tack and then begin to sand it down? If so how much do i need to sand off the body?

Sanding is the one thing I have read about a little here and you may be picking an awfully long row to hoe tackling that.

I have a black Concord I as well and the finish coat and paint coat seem very thick to my feel. I know that the overall thickness down to bare wood can reach a millimeter or more on some models. Pick up several gallons of elbow grease if you catch my meaning.

Here is a link to the nicest green Pantera you will ever see...

http://forum.westoneguitars.net/t1897-pantera-x390-project-complete

Hopefully Sarc will catch your post and be by soon to share his experiences. Put up some pics in the meantime so we may view the patient's condition.

Going from black to white is pretty much back to the bare wood, I'd've thought and boy howdy; if you're gonna do this, be prepared to sand, sand and sand again!! The finish is a very very hard polymer coat and it is very thick indeed on these Westones! I'm sure Sarc will offer some words of encouragement, though... he's turning a 6 string into a 12 string and is quite mad....

_________________FWIW, an after market esoteric nut is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, and a great way to convert your money into someone else’s.

As the boyz have already mentioned, the finish on solid body Westones (Matsumoku's) is tough as nails and thick as molasses, and it will reduce you to tears if attempt to remove it by sanding. I restored a black Aria Pro Urchin last year and changed the original black colour to a butter cream. It required a lot of preparation work but it is do-able.

In my case there were two additional painting attempts by previous owners to get rid of first. I used a chemical stripper for that, followed by light sanding to rough up the original black finish. I did not sand to bare wood though. Instead I applied several coats of grey primer which nicely covered the black and any other paint remnants. The final paint was applied over that (several coats), followed by sealer.

Yes sanding is the bulk of the 'work' but after the research i did, i prefer it to chemicals or heat guns and such. Like Barry said, primer may be the way to go if you are going from dark to light, but it will still involve a lot of sanding.

Once sanded, you want to make sure you do some research on how to paint, apply clear coat and wet sand.This is a good place to start:http://www.projectguitar.com/

Lots of other places on the web with good advice and lots with bad advice - stay away from the 3 min how to paint your guitar on youtube type stuff as they usually skip the wet sanding stuff which is what really gives it the professional look if all else was done correctly.

That being said there are some good youtube vids for some ideas - I like this series:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tS06BUbg_M

Patience is key for the whole thing and make sure you get a really good mask if you are going to sand it - Westone paint can;t be very good for the lungs:)